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Month: October 2015

This afternoon’s SKIFF (Soldiers’ Kids Involved in Fishing Fun) trip exemplifies what SKIFF is all about, and it is what motivates me to work with others to perpetuate this program. Please read on.

Carrolyn Lascano gave our local population of white bass and hybrid stripers a “reel” workout tonight!

Danny “Bubby” Lascano mixed in a little fishing with his shoreline saunter with Mrs. Rebecca, supplemented with plenty of snacks along the way.

Mrs. Kacie Lascano is the wife of U.S. Army Staff Sergeant Danny Lascano. Danny is currently deployed and is working alongside the U.S. Air Force in the United Arab Emirates . Kacie, therefore, has a Herculean task before her. While her husband is away, she will single-handedly served as the parent, caretaker, guardian, and teacher for her two small children. True, many military moms do this well. However, Kacie’s situation is made infinitely more challenging by the fact that her youngest child, 5-year-old Danny (nicknamed “Bubby”), is profoundly autistic.

I am obviously not a physician, but, from just 4 hours on the water yesterday, I could see an unusually bright boy whose body won’t quite cooperate with all his mind is rapidly processing. I also saw the resulting frustration in Bubby at that lack of synchronization. One of the most startling results of all of this is Bubby’s lack of fear to the point where his sense of self-preservation is diminished. Things like jumping into water of unknown depth or latching onto something sharp or pointy are just not things Bubby would balk at. So, Kacie must be truly on-guard 100% of Bubby’s waking hours. This is a tremendously tough, energy-intensive, and tiring job. Bubby has come a long way with the help of his parents, teachers, therapists, and his big sister, Carrolyn (age 6), but there is still a long way to go.

So today, my wife, Rebecca, and I sought to provide Kacie with 4 hours of down time by way of treating Bubby and Carrolyn to a fishing trip on Belton Lake. Kacie’s plan was to have dinner with a girlfriend of hers before that friend moves with the military away from Fort Hood. To accommodate this, Rebecca picked the kids up just outside the gates of Ft. Hood and dropped them back off after the trip to give Kacie as much time as we could and still work within the kids’ school and bedtime schedules.

Normally, I conduct these trips solo, but with hooks, and water, and a prop turning 6,000 rpm, I enlisted my wife’s aid this evening, and I’m glad I did. While Carrolyn stayed engaged in the fishing the entire time, Bubby got restless after our 4th bluegill came over the gunwale, and we had to invent some alternative options. We decided that I would continue fishing on the boat with Carrolyn while Rebecca took to the land with Bubby.

We left the protected cove we were in (which gave up a total of 8 sunfish and 1 largemouth bass), and headed to an area with flatter topography for Rebecca and Bubby to walk on. The beaching operations went smoothly, and Bubby was immediately taken with throwing rocks (lots of rocks!!!) into the water. Rebecca and I agreed to stay in sight of one another and in cell phone contact.

I have no doubt that the Lord transplanted just enough fish to the area all of this happened to take place in to give Carrolyn a wonderful time right up until dark. No sooner did we drop Rebecca and Bubby off than the sonar lit up with fish where I did not really expect to find them. We used downriggers at first and caught both white bass and hybrid striped bass on 3-armed umbrella rigs with Carrolyn doing all the button-pushing on the keypad of the Digi-Trolls to raise and lower the downrigger balls to keep our baits near the fish. Eventually, more fish began to crowd into this area as the sun was about to set, and we simply set the i-Pilot on Spot Lock and sat over a boat-sized area and “wore ’em out” with slabs fished vertically.

We wound up catching 36 white bass and hybrids in all in this area, with our final few fish giving their positions away during a light topwater feed right before dark. Back on shore, Bubby and Rebecca found lots of treasures, covered lots of ground, ate lots of snacks, but were ready to rejoin us when Carrolyn and I returned to shore to pick them back up.

When we got back to the launch site, we quickly transitioned from the boat to my wife’s car, got the kids car-seated, booster-seated, buckled up, and headed back to town while I stayed behind to do all the post-trip chores of draining and cleaning the boat up, re-organizing tackle, etc.

Thanks to the efforts of Dave Hill and Manuel Pena of the Austin Fly FIshers and their work with Cabela’s, as we said farewell to the kids, we were able to give each a tackle box with some basic tackle inside — a mermaid box for Carrolyn and a Spiderman box for Bubby.

Kacie’s plans for dinner with her friend went just right, and, by around 8pm she and the kids headed back through the gates of Fort Hood to prepare for bed and the last school day of the week.

SKIFF (Soldiers’ Kids Involved in Fishing Fun) trips are provided free of charge to families whose children are separated from a parent due to that parent’s military service, thanks to the Austin Fly Fishers and a network of supportive individuals, organizations, and companies from all over the U.S. All it takes is a phone call from a parent to me at 254-368-7411 to reserve a date. SKIFF is open to children in elementary and middle school, as well as youth in high school.

TALLY = 44 FISH, all caught and released

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 3:30p

End Time: 7:30p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 74F

Water Surface Temp: 76F

Wind Speed & Direction: SE8-10

Sky Conditions: Fair skies with 20% cloud cover.

Note: Lake rose sharply due to heavy rains on 24 Oct., but is now being drawn down. Elevation fell 0.69 feet today. Elevation now stands at 597.30 above sea level, with 594.00 being full pool.

After several days of high pressure and winds from the N and E, the winds turned more southerly and the fish responded in a big way. My two novice anglers boated 111 fish in their 4 hour evening trip including white bass, hybrid striped bass, drum, blue catfish, and largemouth bass.

Rachel and Aaron’s faces may be familiar to you, as I took both kids out separately earlier this week (Aaron on Tuesday and Rachel on Thursday). Because she homeschools, mom thought giving the kids a bit of a break from one another might be a good idea. However, they both came back from their trips so enthusiastic and wanting to go again, that Mrs. Cherry called me on Saturday to arrange another trip for the two kids together on Sunday. Rachel’s trip fell under the Ft. Hood SKIES program, and Aaron’s trip fell under the SKIFF program banner. I smiled realizing that fish weren’t the only ones who got “hooked” on the kids’ trips last week.

After days of winds from the north and east, and some pretty tough morning trips wherein the fish just stayed kind of sluggish, this afternoon’s wind shift to the south was quite welcome. We got on the water and essentially drove right to the fish. They were right where I’d anticipated they would be given the direction of the wind. White bass and hybrid stripers often orient on underwater features, and, specifically on the side of those features being most impacted by wind-driven waves. This afternoon was no exception.

In our first hour on the water the kids boated exactly 64 fish — catching more than a fish per minute, literally. These fish were tightly bunched together on the bottom and responded well to slabs fished vertically.

This bite slowed a bit from 5:00p to 6:00, and then bounced back from 6:00p to 6:30p when we found some cooperative schools of suspended fish at the second location we searched. Suspended fish call for downrigging, and the 3-armed umbrella rigs we used to present small baits which imitated the shad these fish were feeding on did the trick. We added 14 more fish to our tally via the downriggers.

By 6:30, we were within a half-hour of sunset, so I moved us a third and final time to position ourselves where I felt our best shot at a shallow, low-light bite would come. As we idled in, I saw a lot of fish and bait, with most all of the action on or near bottom with a few “early bloomers” already beginning to move upwards in the water column for the last feed of the day. We once again hovered and used slabs fished vertically to capitalize on what we’d discovered, then “mopped up” with the downriggers once the sun set and the fish began to wind down. The kids added another 33 fish to the count as these fish also fed very aggressively.

Rachel and Aaron teamed up to boat a grand total of 111 fish of five different species this evening. For the second evening in a row (and under excellent conditions tonight with a moon just past waxing past new) no topwater action occurred as the sun set. I suspect this year’s topwater bite is over for keeps.

TALLY = 111 FISH, all caught and released

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 3:30p

End Time: 7:30p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 84F

Water Surface Temp: 78F

Wind Speed & Direction: ESE10-12

Sky Conditions: Cloudless, fair skies with very dry conditions

Note: Lake has dropped 0.05 feet in the last 24 hours and now stands at 592.68 above sea level, with 594.00 being full pool

This past Saturday morning I welcomed aboard Mohamed and Ethan Barry, accompanied by their mom, Ty. This trip was booked through the Fort Hood SKIES program.

Mohamed Barry landed the largest fish of our trip, this plump 13″ white bass that fell for a Pet Spoon up shallow before the sun got up high in the sky.

Our first fish of the trip was landed by Ethan Barry, just prior to sunrise.

The very first thing that struck me as Ty and her kids made their way down from the parking lot to the floating courtesy dock where my boat was tied up, was how extremely skittish Ty was about the water. She had a white-knuckled death-grip on the handrail of the ramp going from the shore to the floating dock, and was very, very nervous about just standing on the slightly moving dock itself. Making the transition from the dock into my boat took all the courage she could muster, and, once she got in the boat, she sat on the floor as she felt more secure there than being up higher on the seats intended for passengers. Slowly, she got more confident and moved up into a seat, but never to the point of being wild about the whole idea. This lack of ease with the water and the fact that the boys had some lawn maintenance chores to tend to, led Ty to request that we only fish for 2 hours instead of the normally scheduled 4 hours.

So now the pressure was on. I had to get some fish in the boat in just half the time I normally have to accomplish that task.

The boys were a bit cautious about the water, too, but that faded quickly once we got down to the business of fishing. We began this morning right where I left off last night, up shallow in 15-20 feet of water, looking for white bass and hybrid striped bass there in pursuit of shad. Despite the nearly dead calm conditions, and the very cool overnight temperatures, there were indeed some fish up shallow, and we managed to bag 5 white bass before the sun climbed up high enough to kill that shallow water bite. Both boys landed the first fish of their lives right there and then.

Little Ethan’s excited laughter over being connected to a live fish on the end of his line was infectious. He kind of laughed, and kind of giggled, but it was a nervous kind of thing as it was all so new to him. When that fish, a 9.25″ white bass, came over the gunwale, he screamed excitedly and got me laughing so hard it made me realize how much I take for granted doing this for a living, and how used to it I’ve become.

Well, after that low-light shallow bite ended, and with about an hour to go, we headed up shallow and focused on panfish for the remainder of our time. When beginners come out with me that do not have regular access to a boat, I always try to incorporate some panfishing in if the conditions allow, as it is a tactic that can be used from the shoreline with success.

The boys landed 14 bluegill sunfish and a small largemouth bass using slipfloats and live bait. By 9:00am Ty’s “water-meter” had timed out and she was ready to return to terra firma . We took some photos of their catch and headed back across the now-glassy surface to the boat ramp to send them all packing back to Killeen.

In their short trip the boys still managed to catch 20 fish and they had a blast doing it.
SKIES Unlimited stands for School of Knowledge, Inspiration, Exploration and Skills. SKIES Unlimited classes are open to children of active duty military personnel, retirees, Department of the Army civilians, and to Department of Defense contractors. To enroll in SKIES Unlimited activities, children must be registered with CYSS at Building 121 on 761st Tank Destroyer Avenue (right across from the Chili’s restaurant).

There is no charge for registration; parents must bring an ID that shows their affiliation with the military, the child’s shot records, and the report from a recent physical exam. While the SKIES Unlimited programs are not free, many military families are eligible for sizeable credits toward SKIES Unlimited activities. There is a $300 “Army Strong” credit available to each child when their parent is deployed.

TALLY = 20 FISH, all caught and released

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:00a

End Time: 9:00a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 58F

Water Surface Temp: 78F

Wind Speed & Direction: ENE2-3

Sky Conditions: Cloudless, fair skies with very dry conditions

Note: Lake has dropped 0.05 feet in the last 24 hours and now stands at 592.68 above sea level, with 594.00 being full pool

This past Saturday morning I fished with Mrs. Nancy Bowles and her grandson, Bryce Limbacher, in celebration of his 13th birthday which took place back in August.

Bryce Limbacher and his grandma, Nancy Bowles, celebrated his 13th birthday together on the water this morning, boating exactly 50 fish between the two of them.

Just seconds before snapping this photo, sonar revealed the single largest school of fish we’d encountered all morning. Bryce’s rod went off first, then Nancy’s followed. I went up on the bow to snap a shot of them both hooked up at the same time. Bryce wound up landing a triple, and Nancy landed a double.

Nancy, who spent much of her life up north in Maryland, is no fan of the heat, so, she desired to schedule this trip with her grandson after the heat of the summer had passed. She definitely got her wish, as this morning was one of the cooler mornings we’ve had thus far this autumn, with a low of 64F and a stiff NNE breeze making it feel a bit cooler than that. Bryce is a pretty thin kid – a cross-country runner and tuba player – with low body fat and so he stayed chilly until that sun got up and burning real good, and, of course a steady feed of double-stuffed Oreos helped keep the calorie count high to ward off hypothermia. Nancy is a pretty well-traveled angler whose done everything from chase stripers on Buchanan, to sportfishing in the Atlantic, to flyfishing out West. Next week she and a friend head to the Florida keys to chase redfish, snook, and more in the still-warm waters there.

The seasons are definitely beginning to change, and signs of this change have been apparent this past week. The several mild cold fronts that have swept down have brought the season’s first migratory birds. Today alone we observed osprey, cormorants, teal, coots, pelicans, and monarch butterflies, all riding south on the north winds. The fishery is beginning to change, too. The morning topwater action has all but discontinued, and the evening bite has softened considerably. Turnover will occur soon, scrambling things for a bit, then ushering in some great deepwater vertical fishing.

This morning we had to work for all of the fish we caught, putting together a catch of 41 white bass which came off of 3 distinct areas over the first 3.5 hours of our time on the water. The first bite was a low-light bite in the shallowest water we’d find white bass in this morning — between 20-25′. Next we moved into the 30-40′ range and found weak action at the first area we tried, and moderate action at the second deepwater area we tried. Despite seeing 3 schools of bottom-oriented white bass tightly congregated, we could not convince them to perk up and chase. We had 4 hooked fish from such scenarios, but all pulled off the hook before being landed. As I observed sonar as 3 of these 4 fish were being reeled in, I noted that few or no schoolmates were chasing these hooked fish — a sign of disinterest. All of the white bass we landed today came on Pet Spoons fished on a 3-armed umbrella rig.

Bryce really enjoyed the downrigging tactic, as he had envisioned simply sitting and watching a bobber with bait suspended below it before meeting me this morning, but found the downrigging much more engaging, as it involved rigging, routine depth adjustments, constant monitoring for strikes, and, most importantly, it worked! Even so, I did want to expose him to the effectiveness of fishing with a slipfloat and live bait. We set aside the last 30 minutes of the trip to focus on this method. For this panfishing, we headed up into shallow cover, where rocks and wood meet, and went to work. Bryce got the hang of things quickly once he understood how to set the hook once the float disappeared. He was having so much fun working over the bluegill that Nan decided to join in and catch a few of her own. The pair put 8 sunfish and one smallmouth bass in the boat, putting our tally at exactly 50 fish.

With the double-stuffed Oreos completely burned off by Bryce’s high metabolism by this time, we agreed it was a good time to call it a good morning and head up to a Corps of Engineers picnic table for a lunch spread that was waiting back in Nan’s car.

As Angelina had never landed a fish before, “first fish honors” went to her. Fortunately, the fish cooperated for the duration of this afternoon’s trip and there was scarcely a lull in the action. Within minutes of pushing away from the courtesy dock, Angelina was fast to the first fish of her lifetime (a small white bass). The kids took turns on the pair of downrigger rods I have set up for summer-time “above the thermocline” fishing. and, by 6:00pm, they’d landed 40 fish taken from two distinct areas. Most of the catch consisted of small white bass, but we had largmouth, smallmouth, and a white crappie show up in the catch, as well

For variety’s sake, we spent a few minutes up shallow using slipfloats and live bait for panfish from 6:00 to 6:30pm. The kids each put 4 more fish in the boat this way, including green sunfish, bluegill sunfish, and another largemouth bass.

Due to a low bank of clouds in the west, the sun would be obscured tonight prior to normal sunset, so, we positioned ourselves to enjoy a low-light bite by 6:30pm. No sooner did we arrive, than I began to see fish from 12 feet deep down to 25 feet deep over quite an expansive area. We set up downriggers with the balls staggered at different depths and caught fish steadily right up until dark. We boated a final 25 more fish here in the last 45 minutes of the trip. I had an opportunity to observe several other boats that were focusing on the very scant topwater action present, and very few fish were being taken with that approach. As often happens on a N, NNE, NE, or ENE wind, the vigor was taken out of the final, low-light feed, and that extra energy and lack of caution the fish display when feeding on the surface seemed to subside under such high pressure conditions.

Mr. and Mrs. Bravo both commented a number of times about how peaceful and relaxing just coming along for the ride was for them.

When all was said and done, the kids had boated exactly 73 fish between them, and Angelina had earned a TPWD First Fish Award.
SKIES Unlimited stands for School of Knowledge, Inspiration, Exploration and Skills. SKIES Unlimited classes are open to children of active duty military personnel, retirees, Department of the Army civilians, and to Department of Defense contractors. To enroll in SKIES Unlimited activities, children must be registered with CYSS at Building 121 on 761st Tank Destroyer Avenue (right across from the Chili’s restaurant).

There is no charge for registration; parents must bring an ID that shows their affiliation with the military, the child’s shot records, and the report from a recent physical exam. While the SKIES Unlimited programs are not free, many military families are eligible for sizeable credits toward SKIES Unlimited activities. There is a $300 “Army Strong” credit available to each child when their parent is deployed.

TALLY = 73 FISH, all caught and released

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 4:00p

End Time: 7:45p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 88F

Water Surface Temp: 78-79F

Wind Speed & Direction: NNE3-4

Sky Conditions: Cloudless, fair skies with very dry conditions

Note: Lake has dropped 0.05 feet in the last 24 hours and now stands at 592.68 above sea level, with 594.00 being full pool

You may have noticed my previous post was about this past Tuesday evening’s fishing trip with Aaron Cherry. Well, this morning I had the pleasure of fishing with Aaron’s 12 year old sister, Rachel Cherry. Following Aaron’s trip, which fell under the banner of the Fort Hood SKIES program, Aaron’s mother, Charlotte, and I discussed the SKIFF program which is available to children separated from their military parent due to that parent’s duty commitments, and which is offered to the community at no charge, courtesy of the Austin Fly Fishers.

Rachel Cherry with a beautiful Lake Belton green sunfish taken on a slipfloat and live bait in the last hour of our trip.

Rachel poses with the largest of the 15 white bass she boated on a fairly slow morning trip.

At 6:35 AM I arrived at the Cherry’s residence in Nolanville, Texas, and Rachel was bright-eyed and bushytailed in anticipation about this morning’s trip. Since I rarely encounter kids so alert before the sun has risen, I asked where she got all her energy from. As it turns out, Rachel’s mom home-schools, and their home-schooling routine involves a 5:30am wakeup so that Rachel and her brother can have some undivided attention from mom to get lessons started before their 4-year-old sister rouses and requires attention. So, 6:35am was a breeze for this girl!

The conditions we faced this morning were much different, and much tougher, than her brother and I faced just three days ago. We had a glassy calm surface, and very bright sunshine thanks to very clear skies.

We fished for right at four hours, spending the first three hours in pursuit of white bass and hybrid striped bass, and devoting the final hour to panfishing for sunfish up in shallow water. All of nature was a bit sluggish this morning, and although we certainly found fish, they were definitely not aggressive, nor did they appear in great numbers in a feeding mode. We had to work for all 15 of the white bass we caught this morning,. These fish were all scattered and suspended in very small schools of just 3 to 6 fish per school, and they were generally between 27 and 32 feet deep over a slightly deeper bottom.

As we closed out the white bass chapter of our trip and changed our focus to sun fishing, Rachel was taken with the Lake Belton waterfall, so, we swung by there for a “photo op” and then headed up shallow to fish for sunfish. During this time, we put a variety of species in the boat, including smallmouth bass, bluegill sunfish, and green sunfish. Once Rachel got the hang of setting the hook, she did great.

Since Rachel’s brother had come out with me as a part of the Ft. Hood SKIES program, I asked Rachel if she had an opportunity to participate in any of the activities offered through that program, as I thought I’d heard Aaron mention that she took ballet. Rachel scoffed at this and informed me that she preferred doing things that are more hands-on, and that, “I’m just not into wearing tutus.” It was her younger sister who is the aspiring ballerina. When I asked if she had yet considered plans for the future, Rachel told me she wanted to be a horticulturist and shared with me the long list of plant species she is now tending to at her home.

We ended up our day with exactly 20 fish and one 12-year-old girl chomping at the bit to go fishing again!

SKIFF (Soldiers’ Kids Involved in Fishing Fun) trips are provided free of charge to families whose children are separated from a parent due to that parent’s military service, thanks to the Austin Fly Fishers and a network of supportive individuals, organizations, and companies from all over the U.S. All it takes is a phone call from a parent to me at 254-368-7411 to reserve a date. SKIFF is open to children in elementary and middle school, as well as youth in high school.

TALLY = 20 FISH, all caught and released

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:00a

End Time: 11:00a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 67F

Water Surface Temp: 80.0F

Wind Speed & Direction: Light and variable until 9:00am, then blowing suddenly from the NNW at 11-13mph

Sky Conditions: Clear and bluebird.

Note: Lake has dropped 0.05 feet in the last 24 hours and now stands at 592.59 above sea level, with 594.00 being full pool

This past Tuesday afternoon I met up with 14-year-old Aaron Cherry of Nolanville, TX, for a fishing trip on Lake Belton booked through the Fort Hood SKIES program.

Aaron did well at all the tactics we employed today including downrigging, vertical jigging, fan-casting bladebaits, and sight-casting to topwater fish.

After several of the fish we caught and released regurgitated shad they had previously eaten, we made sure our lure size matched what they were feeding on. Shad are a small, oil, energy-rich baitfish that make up the majority of the diet of most of the species of predator fish in Belton Lake.

Right around 3:45pm, Aaron and his mom, Charlotte, arrived at the launch area we’d selected on Belton Lake.

After a bit of paperwork and a safety talk, Aaron and I headed out in search of fish. We started off using downriggers, but very quickly switched over to vertical jigging based on the great number of heavily concentrated fish we discovered holding near bottom.

We started jigging with 3/8 oz. slabs, but, upon discovering the fish were feeding on larger baitfish (based on what we saw them regurgitate), we increased our lure size to 3/4 oz. models.

We picked up just shy of half of our total catch in our first hour on the water as the stiffest breeze of the entire 4-hour trip blew from the NNE during that time. When that breeze subsided, and until the sun began to set, the fishing slowed down.

As has been the case over most of the summer on afternoon trips, we experienced a bit of a lull from 5-6p, but then around 6p, and right up until dark, action steadily increased as fish got more active and moved both shallower and up higher in the water column.

As light topwater action began to break out on the surface after the sun set, I was impressed with how quickly Aaron took to accurately casting to surface-feeding fish with just some basic instruction I’d provided him with earlier in the trip as we practiced fan-casting with blade baits out in deeper water. For his efforts tonight, Aaron landed 70 fish.
SKIES Unlimited stands for School of Knowledge, Inspiration, Exploration and Skills. SKIES Unlimited classes are open to children of active duty military personnel, retirees, Department of the Army civilians, and to Department of Defense contractors. To enroll in SKIES Unlimited activities, children must be registered with CYSS at Building 121 on 761st Tank Destroyer Avenue (right across from the Chili’s restaurant).

There is no charge for registration; parents must bring an ID that shows their affiliation with the military, the child’s shot records, and the report from a recent physical exam. While the SKIES Unlimited programs are not free, many military families are eligible for sizeable credits toward SKIES Unlimited activities. There is a $300 “Army Strong” credit available to each child when their parent is deployed.

TALLY = 70 FISH, all caught and released

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 3:45p

End Time: 7:45p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 90F

Water Surface Temp: 80.6F

Wind Speed & Direction: NNE7-8

Sky Conditions: Cloudless, fair skies with very dry conditions

Note: Lake has dropped 0.05 feet in the last 24 hours and now stands at 592.68 above sea level, with 594.00 being full pool

Other: GT= 0

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area (vicinity) 677/472 for 34 fish when downrigging led to smoking

**Area 1073 downrigging

**Area 1186 3 short hops gradually shallower to keep up with fish ramping up for twilight bite

This past Saturday afternoon I fished with U.S. Army Sergeants First class Frederick Harriel and Marcus Taylor. Frederick’s wife, Lakeshia, presented him with a fishing gift certificate earlier this year, and Frederick contacted me several weeks ago looking to cash it in.

From left: Fredrick Harriel and Marcus Taylor with the first and largest hybrid striper we boated on this trip. Both fellows are big college football fans, so much so that during our entire trip each had apps running on their cell phones giving audible alerts as to when their teams made progress.

Here Marcus holds one of the larger white bass we caught. “Keeper” sized fish have been the exception instead of the rule all summer as lots of small fish have made up the majority of the catch.

A mild cold front moved into the area the night before leaving in its wake high clear and cloudless skies, a northerly breeze, and high-pressure. Fortunately, the cold front was mild and therefore did not put the fishing off too badly. I waited to fish in the afternoon instead of in the morning (as the high-pressure built in).

Frederick had some fresh- and saltwater fishing experience prior to this trip, as his dad runs a boat on the St. Johns River, near its mouth on the Atlantic coast of Florida. Neither had freshwater fishing experience with downriggers nor with the vertical tactics that we used during the mid part of this evening’s trip. As has been the case nearly all summer on afternoon trips, we began fishing with downriggers in order to search for bottom-oriented fish.

The first area we fished gave up fish, but all the fish we encountered were holding together in small, suspended schools, with no bottom-oriented fish to be seen. The bottom-huggers tend to move less and be more susceptible to a vertical jigging approach, thus allowing for more efficiency and more fish to be caught in a given period of time, so, if they are anywhere to be found, I prefer to focus on them.

With about 30 fish boated, we moved onto our next area. Here, downrigging allowed us to fish and search at the same time. This searching finally led to discovery of some bottom-oriented fish clustered tightly together. We e-anchored over these fish with Spot-Lock and put over 40 more fish in the boat including white bass, hybrid, and even one largemouth bass.

Once the action died, we moved on to check out another area — found a few small white bass on bottom in ~25′ but left pretty quickly as it didn’t seem things were going to come together.

We made our final move of the evening around 6:40p to a gentle breakline connecting two flats, one at 25′ and one at 30′. As I idled in, the water column was filled with fish from 12 feet down to bottom, but, they were scattered, not schooled up. We downrigged briefly, but, as soon as the sun neared setting below the horizon, topwater action kicked in very quickly.

Fredrick and Marcus put the icing on the cake with a final 20+ fish taken on topwater in the closing half-hour of our trip, taking our tally up to 102 fish.

Generally speaking the fish are still smallish, and we landed only one legal (18″+) hybrid striped bass, but the action was fast on the many smaller fish we encountered.

This afternoon I conducted an after-school Soldiers’ Kids Involved in Fishing Fun (SKIFF) trip for Eli T. and Jaythan S., both of Ft. Hood, TX.

Eli T. with one of the many white bass that we caught on the 3-armed umbrella rig equipped with Pet Spoons this evening.

Jaythan S. caught the first fish of his life on this evening’s SKIFF trip.

This past Friday afternoon I conducted the season’s 21st Soldiers’ Kids Involved in Fishing Fun (SKIFF) trip. I had the pleasure of fishing with two energetic seven-year-old boys, Eli and Jaythan. Both boys’ fathers are away from home for training. Eli has fished with me once before when his dad was pulled away from the family by military duty, and this was Jason’s first trip out with me; in fact, he had never caught a fish before.

We begin our day under warm, humid, nearly calm conditions. We first encountered fish suspended at around 30 feet deep over a slightly deeper bottom and downrigged successfully to boat singles, doubles, and triples using umbrella rigs equipped with small Pet Spoons. This effort allowed for the capture of Jason’s first fish, thus qualifying him for a T PWD “First Fish Award”.

The downrigging at this first area we fished gave up a total of 31 fish before the action died, sending us looking elsewhere. We encountered a bit of a lull in the action between 5 PM and 6 PM, picking up only six more fish at the second area we fished that during this time.

Thanks to some building and fairly heavy grey cloud cover in the west, sunset was obscured and the low light preceding it came a bit early, right around 6 PM. At this time we moved to the third area we would fish and found both bottom-oriented, and suspended fish. The suspended fish were holding at two levels, one group at around 23 to 27 feet, and another group just 12 to 14 feet below the surface. We employed downriggers at both depths and caught fish consistently at both depths right up until 7 PM. At 7 PM, the fish made a very distinct move shallow and surfacewards with occasional fish feeding on the surface. At the same time, the wind very suddenly picked up to about 8 to 10 mph out of the north in advance of a mild, dry, cool front that would continue to make its way into this area overnight. That wind shift really sucked the energy out of what is normally a very aggressive, low light bite at this point in the evening. Although we continued to catch fish right until 7:35 on downriggers and flatlined tandem rigs, and continued to see some light surface action, this was nothing in comparison to what it has been over the past several days with more stable, southerly winds in place.

The boys, already familiar with one another from school, and being the same age, really hit it off well. They realized following instructions directly impacted their success, and listened very well to the somewhat technical instructions pertaining to downrigging. When all was said and done, the boys landed a total of 67 fish consisting of a mixture of short hybrid striped bass, short white bass, and legal-sized white bass.

SKIFF (Soldiers’ Kids Involved in Fishing Fun) trips are provided free of charge to families whose children are separated from a parent due to that parent’s military service, thanks to the Austin Fly Fishers and a network of supportive individuals, organizations, and companies from all over the U.S. All it takes is a phone call from a parent to me at 254-368-7411 to reserve a date. SKIFF is open to children in elementary and middle school, as well as youth in high school.TALLY = 67 FISH, all caught and released

This afternoon I met up with the Leonovich kids — Ethan (age 13), Ava (age 9), and Emaline (age 5) — for a Ft. Hood SKIES Program “Fishing 101” trip on Belton Lake. Chaperoning today were Hank and Diana, the kids’ maternal grandparents who are visiting from Vermont.

From left: The Leonovich kids: Emaline, Ava, and Ethan, with several of the “keeper”-sized white bass we landed on downriggers this evening.

Emaline proudly displays the first fish she ever caught, earning her a First Fish Award from TPWD.

Once we got everyone boarded and provided with both a safety talk and a bit of a demo on how to use both baitcasting reels and spinning reels, we shoved off in search of fish. We decided we’d take turns in order from youngest to oldest as we used the pair of downriggers I have aboard to present 6 baits at depths the fish were holding at today. We were fortunate to come across fish very quickly (less than 2 minutes from putting the gear down and less than 5 minutes from shoving off from the dock), and the kids did great on taking turns, catching singles, doubles, and triples on the 3-armed umbrella rigs we were using.

The kids’ mom, Gretchen, let me know that Hank and Diana might not make the full 4-hours on the water, and, indeed, around the 2.25 hour mark, Grandpa gave me the high sign to start winding things down.

All 35 fish we boated today came on the downriggers. We set at ~25′ deep at our first area for fish holding along the bottom, and we set at 10-12′ at our second area for large schools of fish down at 11-15 feet over 35-45 feet of water.

Emaline had never landed a fish before today’s trip. Texas Parks and Wildlife Department offers a “First Fish Award” to anglers landing their first fish, so, the very first fish Emaline reeled in, an 8″ white bass, qualified her for this distinction. Good thing she wore a floral dress, earrings, and a hair bow for the occasion!
SKIES Unlimited stands for School of Knowledge, Inspiration, Exploration and Skills. SKIES Unlimited classes are open to children of active duty military personnel, retirees, Department of the Army civilians, and to Department of Defense contractors. To enroll in SKIES Unlimited activities, children must be registered with CYSS at Building 121 on 761st Tank Destroyer Avenue (right across from the Chili’s restaurant).

There is no charge for registration; parents must bring an ID that shows their affiliation with the military, the child’s shot records, and the report from a recent physical exam. While the SKIES Unlimited programs are not free, many military families are eligible for sizeable credits toward SKIES Unlimited activities. There is a $300 “Army Strong” credit available to each child when their parent is deployed.

TALLY = 35 FISH, all caught and released

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 3:45p

End Time: 6:00p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 87F

Water Surface Temp: 84.6F

Wind Speed & Direction: SSE9-10

Sky Conditions: 45% grey cloud cover on a fair sky. More humid today than the day before.

Note: Lake has dropped 0.05 feet in the last 24 hours and now stands at 592.89 above sea level, with 594.00 being full pool